


Placebo

by mizael



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-07
Updated: 2015-04-07
Packaged: 2018-03-21 19:09:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3702701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mizael/pseuds/mizael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even if I use the strongest weapons, I can’t destroy your unchanging feelings.<br/>I’m powerless, aren’t I?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Placebo

**Author's Note:**

> _even without the strongest weapons, i'm sure i can destroy your unchanging feelings_  
>  ahahaha dont look at me i'm akayuu trash
> 
> inspired by [missile killer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQNFcL2cWII)

The best view of Maiami is, without a doubt, from the very top of the LDS skyscraper that dominates the center of the city.

But Yuuya doesn’t have time to enjoy the view (none of them do, anymore, when Reiji called them his  _Lancers_ ) from his seat next to the window. The giant glass wall that outlooks the city is cold, lonely, impenetrable and desolate. Yuuya just presses his hands against it, savoring the feel of freezing glass on his warm palms, and sighs.

“Do you regret it?” are the first words he’s spoken all night, when Reiji called him up to his office and Yuuya sat but did not speak (he never does, and that’s fine).

The tapping of fingers on keys stops.

“What part of it?” Reiji knows exactly what he’s talking about, but he prefers to hear it straight from Yuuya’s mouth. It’s the kind of person he is.

“The Battle Royale. Everyone that made it. Everyone that didn’t,” Yuuya turns his eyes from the window to Reiji at his desk, illuminated by the glow of his desktop monitor. It’s always spotless--the desk, he means--never a single paper unsorted or filed, never a drop of food stain, never anything but Reiji’s arms and hands and everything he intends to be there in the way he wants them to be there.

“Do you want me to say what you want to hear?”

Yuuya’s hands ball into fists. “... No.”

“Then I don’t regret it,” Reiji turns his eyes back to the monitor and resumes typing something--a mission report, maybe. Research? Reconnaissance? Yuuya doesn’t feel like caring (doesn’t _want_  to).

The room goes silent again, only the sound of computer drives humming and Reiji’s fingers on the keyboard. The clock on the far wall blares its red 3:25 AM sign to Yuuya. He lets his head roll back and touch the glass, the exhaustion wearing on him as he sighs again.

Reiji might not regret it, but he cares, and that’s what frustrates Yuuya. He wants so badly to  _hate_  him, to let the rage fuel his systems and his spirit and to want to completely crush Akaba Reiji until he repents for what he’s done. But Akaba Reiji  _cares_  and Yuuya isn’t the type of person to hate, no matter how much of Yuuto and that darkness is inside him.

As if to prove his point, the clock changes to 3:26 AM and Yuuya remembers that Reiji had been working, typing, scheduling, researching since he woke--no, that’s not right. Reiji didn’t sleep last night: he pulled an all nighter going through tournament footage, battle footage, memorizing Academia duel strategies and formulating defenses to combat the oncoming invasion. Yuuya had tried to stay awake with him, but he had collapsed sometime around two in the morning, and he can feel the sleep coming again.

Yuuya groans and shoves his hands over his face, tangling fingers in red and green locks. Akaba Reiji  _cares_.

(It’s like a mantra in his head.)

The minutes tick by.

“Do you know why?” Reiji breaks the silence this time.

Yuuya doesn’t grace him with an answer.

“If I did, their efforts would be for naught,” and he hears the soft roll of wheels on wood as Reiji stands up. “I would second-guess my plans.”

He feels the touch of a cold hand on his cheek, and Yuuya blearily opens his eyes to meet with purple through red frames. Despite everything, Reiji’s hands are soft, caressing, nothing like the villain Yuuya wants him to be.

“A leader that isn’t confident is not a leader but a destroyer,” Reiji continues. Yuuya just feels the hand on his cheek now, Reiji’s voice distorting somewhere in his daze.

“But are you our leader?” he asks.

“No,” the answer is quick. “You are.”

The burden of responsibility is crushing.

(The realization that Reiji cares for him even more so.)

Yuuya reaches up to cradle the hand on his cheek, red eyes wearily looking at Reiji’s desk. The monitor is still on, some half-written report pasted on the screen, cursor blinking to remind him that he has more to type. The clock changes to 3:35 AM.

“You should sleep,” is what he says instead.

“I have work.”

Yuuya’s hands move up to Reiji’s face, thumbs pressing gently into his high cheekbones, fingers curled around his hair. From far away, Reiji is the perfect image of a crisp businessman, angled jawlines and sharp eyes, but when Reiji’s nose is almost brushing his own, he sees the dark circles under his eyes, the bags of exhaustion that try to hide themselves from him (the proof that he cares).

Yuuya laughs, silently, eyes crinkling with dimples as he stares up at Reiji with soft eyes. “Academia can wait.”

Yuuya cares, too. Cares too much about Akaba Reiji trying so hard to protect what he loves, cares too much about the man that sent him unknowingly into the battlefield (cares too much about him saying words like “your dueling is refreshing”).

(Perhaps not  _caring_  but  _understanding_? Yuuya doesn’t want to admit it.)

“As we stand right now, we can’t--”

“Reiji,” it’s a whisper, but Reiji stills.

Yuuya scoots over a bit on the couch (brought up for him, because Reiji’s office is so large and bare and  _isn’t that lonely_ , he’d said) and Reiji takes the hint to sit down next to him. Their hands leave each other, but Yuuya reaches over to loosen the scarf around his neck enough to squeeze under it until they’re wrapped together.

Reiji doesn’t protest, just sighs and lets it unfold, but Yuuya knows his exasperation is only for show.

“I’m not happy,” he says, head leaning over onto Reiji’s shoulder. The twisted cylinders in the ceiling seem to gleam. “Lancers, Academia, battling,  _Yuuzu_...”

Reiji doesn’t speak.

“I want to hate you,” he continues. “For Yuuzu, for Mitchie, for everyone that’s gone. For your lack of regret. For your planning. For... everything.”

Reiji tilts his head over to rest atop Yuuya’s. “But?”

Yuuya just smiles into the scarf, doesn’t say anything more. “This office is always so barren.”

“I only need the necessities,” Reiji shifts, reaches out to bring Yuuya’s legs onto his lap, and he complies.

“You should sleep,” he tries again.

“I should,” the answer is different. Reiji’s arms wrap around him, and Yuuya closes his eyes. The clock reads 3:40 AM now.

But in the end, Yuuya falls asleep first, body relaxing in his embrace, his body not used to staying awake for so long. He feels Reiji shift again ten minutes later, but by that time he’s already half-way into his subconscious, and doesn’t protest.

In the morning, Yuuya wakes up to a red scarf covering his body, back aching with regrets of sleeping on the couch. He sighs and stretches, checks the clock that reads 10:15 AM, and looks over to Reiji’s desk.

Reiji is collapsed on top, cheek pressing into the wood, arms thrown around the keyboard, body hunched over. When he walks over to check, the monitor flashes  _Last edit at 7:28 AM by Akaba Reiji_ , and he smiles softly.

“Good night, Reiji.”

**Author's Note:**

> comments? ♥


End file.
